dianaschnuth

We’re closing out the third summer we’ve been in this house of ours in Zone 6a/6b, with all the established flowerbeds that seemed so beautiful yet daunting. I’m learning how true it is that a garden is a living, changing thing — some plants thrive, others get buried in mulch by well-meaning landscapers, still others succumb to a bad winter (or two).

Some of the color from previous autumns has failed to return this year — mums, Joe Pye weed, and late-blooming roses are all failing to come through for one reason or another (but mostly due to being the deer snack bar). So, I’m latching onto the few bits of color I can find, and making plans for the spring.

This mophead hydrangea, to my knowledge, is not a repeat bloomer, so I’m not sure what it thinks it’s doing, trying to bloom so close to the first frost. Guessing this confusion will mean no blooms come next summer…

I’m not sure what this slightly smelly groundcover is, but it’s turning a lovely shade of purple. I’ve given up trying to eradicate it and am instead letting it do its thing — but keeping it from crowding out other plants in the same bed.

This groundcover is in what I’m calling my Future Cottage Garden, where I’ll be planting pollinator-friendly flowers over the coming years. So, it will eventually be removed when I plant (or transplant) more things here, and establish some pathways through the bed. This weekend, I relocated a pink-flowering volunteer viburnum into this bed, and dug up a peony from another bed to transplant here. I sure hope at least a few divisions of that peony survive; I didn’t mean to break it up into 12 separate plants!

But I digress. Bloom Day.

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In my Zone 6a/6b garden in Northwest Ohio, not nearly as much is happening as usually does in September. The early summer rains and the late summer drought (or maybe it just seemed like a drought by comparison) really confused a lot of the plants. And some of them, like the Joe Pye Weed and a few others, were possibly victims of the deer buffet.

I’ve also been slack with weeding — I’m still relatively new with this gardening thing, as I kind of jumped in with both feet three summers ago when we bought this house with all its established beds and borders. I find that I’ve gotten better at weeding and deadheading each year, but every year there comes a point when I just throw up my hands and say, fine. You win, weeds. Every year it’s a different dominant weed; this year, it was bermudagrass (if I identified it correctly).

But this is bloom day! What am I thinking? Less kvetching and more pictures!

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Here in Zone 6a/6b, summer started off rainy and mild, but finally settled down to a normal, warmish, less-waterlogged typical summer.

I haven’t been out to weed or maintain my flowers for a few weeks — rain, houseguests, Life just getting in the way, as Life does (especially when one has a four-year-old son). Yesterday evening, after dinner, my son and I took the tour around my various beds and borders to document what’s in bloom this August. Here’s what we turned up.

As always, the hydrangea paniculata takes first prize amongst all my flowering perennials for Most Awesome Flowers With Least Amount Of Maintenance.

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